This is a strange place

As our time in Kenya was drawing to a close, we made the decision to move to Washington, D.C., and we did so for many reasons. We had wanted to move to the East Coast for some time, even during the time we had lived in Chicago, and we wanted to be close to the excitement that happens in the federal government. I am interested in politics and eagerly followed the presidential campaign from Kenya.

When I arrived here and began searching for a job, I continued to dream about working in some place in the government, either for an agency or on Capitol Hill. But I knew I wasn't likely to get a government job after I learned that agency jobs are so specialized and one often needs obscure knowledge or skills, such as knowledge of government printing regulations for the type of jobs that I was looking for, or that one needs previous Capitol Hill or legislative experience to work in the House or Senate. Still, I ended up getting a job working for a government contractor, a nonprofit that receives all of its funding from the federal government and that is influenced a bit by the whims of Congress. Plus my office ended up being just two blocks from America's most powerful address: 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. NW. At least two times a day, and more if I leave the office at lunch, I cross 16th St. and catch a glimpse of the White House at the end of the street.

A funny thought struck me the other day, in the midst of all the hubbub of the hearings for Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court. Here we are living in the city, a place we've chosen to live, unlike so many people who move to the area and choose to live in the suburbs, where some of the country's biggest news stories take place. We know that when the president holds a news conference, it's taking place mere miles from us. The biggest story lately, the Sotomayor hearings, has taken place in our home city. What makes the national news is essentially the same as our local news. So, given all that, it struck me as strange that I'm probably not following any of these happenings, events or news stories any more closely than I did when I lived outside D.C. or the country. During the Sotomayor hearings, I was sitting a mere mile or so at work from where the hearings were taking place, yet they didn't affect me personally or in my work at all. I did not see in person any sign of any disruption or the excitement surrounding the hearings.

It has also been strange to move from Geneva to Nairobi to Washington, D.C. In both of our jobs in Geneva, working for international organizations, we spent a lot of time worrying and thinking about places all over the world, from Indonesia to Colombia, from Sudan to China. We were internationally minded. In Nairobi, we were still concerned with many of the same issues from our jobs in Geneva - refugees, hunger, poverty - but still on a fairly large - a regional - scale. We expected to have much of the same mentality here in D.C. when we moved here. It's not only the country's capital, but it's the world's capital in many ways. One of the reasons we wanted to live here is because it's fun to be near the center of the excitement, where big, important decisions that affect the whole world are made all the time, much like Geneva. Yet what type of news am I reading more about and am I more concerned about? I read the Yahoo discussion group for Brookland, our neighborhood, and I am reminded that all politics is local. Even though politics in this city is the main industry and is something that everybody across the country knows about, what people in the capital city often seem more concerned about is if their representative to the city council is behaving well or not, or if the police are doing their job fighting crime. We have gone from such global concerns, such as worries if hundreds of people will be helped next week in a disaster or through a new well, to worries about cars being stolen on the block north of us. I'm not really following the international news much anymore, which is harder to get in the U.S. anyway. It's funny how our mentality and outlook has changed - and how quickly.

I still have a desire to be connected to more of the world in the ways we once were. I am working for an organization that works nationally, which I appreciate. Maybe in a future job in this city I can return to the international arena or get into more government-type work where big decisions are made that affect people far away. But for now, we're sort of caught and wrapped up in this city that's got a strange mixture of local, national and international concerns.